Truce hurts: Militants, West ‘want Assad discredited’

Members of the rebel 'Free Syrian Army' gather inside their quarters in the Syrian town of Binnish (Binesh), in the restive northern Idlib province, on March 22, 2012. (AFP Photo / Ricardo Garcia Vilanova) / AFP

Moscow has accused the Syrian armed opposition of inflaming the conflict to “bury” the peace plan by UN special envoy Kofi Annan and breach the truce. Experts say militants are trying to stir up the conflict to discredit Assad’s regime.

“The ceasefire is being observed, except for some violations by weak and fragmented groups,” Manna told RT, adding that “They continue hostilities in order to engage the army in fighting, so that it stands against the Syrian people.”

Eric Denece, director and founder of the French Center for Intelligence Studies, also believes that the primary purpose of the armed rebels is “to push them to react so strong.”

“They [militants] want the regime of President Assad to be absolutely discredited because it did not respect the ceasefire,” he said , “It is a kind of a game as they want to put additional international pressure on the regime.”

Different armed factions defying the ceasefire in Syria are being backed by foreign sponsors, the activist asserted.

“Most of the opposition, supported by Western and Arab countries, is made of terrorist and Salafist groups. They use the bases in Turkey as a safe haven to go back to Syria everyday to create new turmoil and new attacks at the regime,” he said.

According to Denece, three interests intersect in Syria: the US want to support Israel’s regime and to weaken Iran; Gulf states such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia want to impose Salafist regimes everywhere in the Middle East; and there is also France, who is against Syria because they suspect Damascus to be behind Lebanese PM Rafic Hariri’s assassination in 2005.

“France, the United States, NATO with the support of the Saudi Arabia and Qatar, they think they can change the sense of history in Syria but I don’t think this is something they can do,” Denece concluded.